A recent $25,000 match­ing grant from the Auen Foun­da­tion made the pur­chase of a 15-pas­sen­ger van for Mama’s House pos­si­ble. The van trans­ports the 10 res­i­dent moms and their babies to appoint­ments, school, and oth­er out­ings.

“We were unable to car­ry all the moms and babies togeth­er in our small six-pas­sen­ger van, rely­ing on our vol­un­teers to help out with their own cars or vans,” said Jan Lupia, Mama’s House founder and CEO.

Dur­ing a recent site vis­it by Sher­rie Auen and Catharine Reed, Sher­rie men­tioned, “If you can find $25,000, we’ll offer a match­ing grant to pur­chase a van.”

Lupia sent out an email request to her vol­un­teers and board, and with­in an hour she said major donor Anne Thomp­son-Sil­ver­stein respond­ed with the match­ing funds.

With the help of Paul Thiel, Max Tal­lon and Tyler Van­do­ra of Palm Springs Motors, Mama’s House found a “very good price” on a near­ly-new, low-mileage Ford XLT 15 pas­sen­ger van.

“With this big van we do not need to have as many on-call vol­un­teer dri­vers,” said Lupia. “There is now enough room for all our res­i­dents, their babies in car seats, plus strollers and dia­per bags. Many times moms are going to the same place at the same time, so being able to trans­port every­one at once saves gas, and our pre­cious vol­un­teers’ time for oth­er needs.”

Mama’s House offers a safe, sup­port­ive, lov­ing res­i­den­tial envi­ron­ment for women who are fac­ing an unplanned preg­nan­cy, vul­ner­a­ble with no place to live or means of sup­port. Mama’s House expand­ed edu­ca­tion­al and coun­sel­ing ser­vices with the open­ing of the Hope Cen­ter in June, 2017 at 44875 Deep Canyon, Suite 2. Hope Cen­ter is a suite of offices, meet­ing and class­room space where a full spec­trum of edu­ca­tion and coun­sel­ing pro­grams are now avail­able to res­i­dent moms.

AAP — Food Samar­i­tans (AAP) hon­ored sev­er­al sig­nif­i­cant com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers and orga­ni­za­tions at its 25th Annu­al Evening Under the Stars gala at the O’Donnell Golf Club in Palm Springs. The hon­orees include Auen Foun­da­tion, rep­re­sent­ed by Sher­rie Auen, Ron Auen, and Catharine Reed for the Jean­nette Rock­e­feller Human­i­tar­i­an Award, The Desert Sun Media Group for the Glo­ria Greene Inspi­ra­tion Award, Desert Ten­nis Asso­ci­a­tion, rep­re­sent­ed by Nabil Naj­jar for the Herb Lazen­by Com­mu­ni­ty Ser­vice Award, and Denise Haslam and Angela Slater for the Frank Jur­czyk Vol­un­teer Award. The hon­orees will receive pub­lic recog­ni­tion at the annu­al fundrais­ing event.

“AAP – Food Samar­i­tans could not ful­fill our mis­sion with­out the ded­i­ca­tion and sup­port of the incred­i­ble peo­ple and orga­ni­za­tions that sup­port us,” said Mark Anton, CEO/Executive Direc­tor of AAP – Food Samar­i­tans. “With­out their car­ing and inspi­ra­tional guid­ance, we would not be able to sup­port the nutri­tion­al needs of those low-income indi­vid­u­als liv­ing with HIV/AIDS and oth­er chron­ic ill­ness­es in our com­mu­ni­ty. We are so very grate­ful for their unyield­ing kind­ness that they exhib­it on a dai­ly basis not only for AAP, but for many oth­er orga­ni­za­tions across the entire Coachel­la Val­ley.”

Evening Under the Stars is the largest annu­al fundrais­er for AAP – Food Samar­i­tans, a non-prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that pro­vides nutri­tion­al sup­port for low-income peo­ple liv­ing with HIV/AIDS and oth­er chron­ic ill­ness­es. Gala fes­tiv­i­ties began with a “quin­tes­sen­tial­ly Palm Springs” sun­set cock­tail hour against a back­drop of the majes­tic San Jac­in­to Moun­tains. The awards pro­gram, emceed by actors Bob­bie Eakes and San­ford Reed, rec­og­nized the inspi­ra­tional hon­orees includ­ing the Auen Foun­da­tion.

“Sher­rie and Ron Auen, and Catharine Reed are three of the most car­ing peo­ple in the world,” said Anton. “They each have a gift for know­ing how to make sig­nif­i­cant impacts. It is with deep grat­i­tude that AAP is able to count itself among those who are pos­i­tive­ly affect­ed by the kind­ness and gen­eros­i­ty of the Auen Foun­da­tion and also pub­licly rec­og­nize them with this award.”

The Jean­nette Rock­e­feller Human­i­tar­i­an Award is named after Jean­nette Rock­e­feller, the found­ing pres­i­dent of AAP – Food Samar­i­tans. The award was estab­lished in 1997 to hon­or the human­i­tar­i­an efforts of out­stand­ing com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers and rec­og­nizes indi­vid­u­als who have lent their ener­gy, com­mit­ment, and influ­ence to raise aware­ness and fund­ing for impor­tant issues includ­ing HIV/AIDS. Pre­vi­ous recip­i­ents include Earl Green­berg, R. D. & Joan Dale Hub­bard, Helene Galen, James Hous­ton, Harold Matzn­er, and Sen­a­tor Bar­bara Box­er, among oth­ers.

The awards pre­sen­ta­tion was fol­lowed by a deli­cious din­ner and then a per­for­mance by Gladys Knight, the “Empress of Soul.” After her show, danc­ing con­tin­ued with DJ Jer­ry Bon­ham on the main stage fol­lowed by an amaz­ing fire­works dis­play. Over the past 25 years, Evening Under the Stars has fea­tured the tal­ents of a wide vari­ety of enter­tain­ers. Melis­sa Man­ches­ter, Bar­ry Manilow, Nan­cy Wil­son, Pink Mar­ti­ni, The B-52s, The Go-Go’s, Cyn­di Lau­per, Vil­lage Peo­ple, and many oth­ers have tak­en the stage in sup­port of this wor­thy cause.

For more infor­ma­tion about AAP- Food Samar­i­tans, call 760–325-8481 or vis­it aidsassistance.org.

While col­lege is an excit­ing time for many stu­dents, oth­ers have the stress­ful real­i­ty of financ­ing their edu­ca­tion to sup­port their dreams. Two grants from the Auen Foun­da­tion aim to alle­vi­ate that bur­den for some local col­lege stu­dents caught in what is termed a “gap.” This is where many stu­dents fall when they don’t qual­i­fy for state and fed­er­al need-based aid, but have dif­fi­cul­ty pay­ing for col­lege expens­es, par­tic­u­lar­ly when unfore­seen cir­cum­stances arise.

“Many stu­dents are above the income thresh­old, but are still strug­gling to pay for school and the cost of liv­ing,” said Peter Stur­geon, with the Col­lege of the Desert (COD) Foun­da­tion, which received a $50,000 grant to assist stu­dents in its rig­or­ous nurs­ing pro­gram. “This is espe­cial­ly dif­fi­cult for those peo­ple sup­port­ing more than just them­selves. Many of our nurs­ing stu­dents are sin­gle par­ents and vet­er­ans, look­ing to improve their lives and the finan­cial secu­ri­ty of their fam­i­lies.”

“These funds will help stu­dents who are prob­a­bly already mak­ing sac­ri­fices and fac­ing chal­lenges to attend uni­ver­si­ty,” said Dr. Sharon Brown-Wel­ty, Dean of Cal­i­for­nia State Uni­ver­si­ty, San Bernardi­no (CSUSB) Palm Desert Cam­pus, which received a $50,000 grant ear­marked for emer­gency assis­tance for qual­i­fy­ing stu­dents.

As stu­dents apply for these emer­gency grants, CSUSB Palm Desert Cam­pus admin­is­tra­tors plan to col­lect addi­tion­al data to deter­mine con­sis­tent obsta­cles that impede on col­lege stu­dents’ suc­cess­es. It is already known that the col­lege attain­ment rate in the Coachel­la Val­ley is less than 30 per­cent for all adults, and only 12 per­cent for His­pan­ic adults, which make up 40 per­cent of the com­mu­ni­ty. Under­stand­ing how to attract and sup­port addi­tion­al stu­dents is a com­po­nent of how the Auen Foun­da­tion gift will fur­ther assist CSUSB Palm Desert Cam­pus.

“The Auen Foun­da­tion believes in the impor­tance of high­er edu­ca­tion in our com­mu­ni­ty, and we con­tin­u­al­ly look for ways to part­ner with our local col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties,” said Catharine Reed, Senior Pro­gram Offi­cer of the Auen Foun­da­tion. “A col­lege edu­ca­tion is becom­ing increas­ing­ly crit­i­cal for job secu­ri­ty, and we want to sup­port those stu­dents in our area who are mak­ing a com­mit­ment to achieve that goal.”

Each insti­tu­tion has its own appli­ca­tion process to qual­i­fy stu­dents for grants between $1,500-$2,500 per cal­en­dar year to sup­port imme­di­ate and short-term chal­lenges that hin­der indi­vid­ual suc­cess. Fund­ing is allo­cat­ed on a case-by-case basis, but pos­si­ble uses may include text­book and oth­er course sup­plies, short-term trans­porta­tion needs, sup­port for house­hold basics in extra­or­di­nary cir­cum­stances, or tem­po­rary child­care resources.

“An incred­i­ble 60 per­cent of our stu­dents qual­i­fy for max­i­mum fed­er­al and state finan­cial aid, and 36 per­cent of our stu­dents live at or below the pover­ty line. For stu­dents scrap­ing to assure they are in col­lege, the expens­es of books and even food and trans­porta­tion can be addi­tion­al bar­ri­ers we are work­ing to over­come by estab­lish­ing this pro­gram through the gen­er­ous sup­port of the Auen Foun­da­tion,” said Dr. Brown-Wel­ty.

Sup­port of high­er edu­ca­tion, par­tic­u­lar­ly in fields relat­ed to med­i­cine and ser­vices aimed at meet­ing the needs of mature adults and their fam­i­lies, aligns with the Auen Foundation’s mis­sion to enhance the qual­i­ty of life for the aging pop­u­la­tion.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Auen Foun­da­tion recent­ly met two pup­pies they are spon­sor­ing for guide dog train­ing at Guide Dogs of the Desert. Sher­rie Auen, Pro­gram Direc­tor, and Catharine Reed, Senior Pro­gram Offi­cer, named the stan­dard poo­dles Katie and Sandy after fam­i­ly mem­bers.

“It was great to meet these pup­pies, which will be trained to make an impor­tant impact in two people’s lives,” said Reed. “These lov­able pup­pies have no idea how impor­tant that are.”

The pup­pies will first be raised by a fos­ter fam­i­ly until they are 18–20 months old, and then they will live and train at the facil­i­ty in White­wa­ter where they will par­tic­i­pate in a rig­or­ous 4–6 month train­ing. If the dogs com­plete the pro­gram and reach grad­u­a­tion, each will be placed with a per­son who is visu­al­ly impaired. Togeth­er this new team will train fur­ther at the organization’s live-in facil­i­ty for 28 days in order for the dog to help pro­vide its new own­er safe mobil­i­ty, com­pan­ion­ship and inde­pen­dence.

Since 1972, Guide Dogs of the Desert has grad­u­at­ed more than 1,375 teams from its pro­gram, all accred­it­ed by the Inter­na­tion­al Guide Dog Fed­er­a­tion. The orga­ni­za­tion breeds and has rela­tion­ships with breed­ers of Labrador Retriev­ers, Gold­en Retriev­ers, Stan­dard Poo­dles, and some Ger­man Shep­herds.

“By care­ful­ly main­tain­ing a spe­cif­ic pedi­gree, we increase our suc­cess of grad­u­at­ing high­ly qual­i­fied dogs that can tru­ly enhance a person’s life,” said Sarah Clapp, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of Guide Dogs of the Desert.

“It was won­der­ful to see how these pup­pies are cared for and trained in a very spe­cif­ic way that has a high suc­cess rate,” said Auen. “We are look­ing for­ward to com­ing back to watch our Katie and Sandy grad­u­ate with their own­ers and see them off to a life of ser­vice that only these spe­cial­ly-trained dogs can pro­vide. It’s all very heart­warm­ing, and we are hap­py to be a part of this process.”

Guide Dogs of the Desert is locat­ed at 60735 Dil­lon Road, White­wa­ter. For more infor­ma­tion vis­it guidedogsofthedesert.org or call (760) 329‑6257.

Coachel­la Val­ley Horse Res­cue was thrilled when two air con­di­tion­ing units were donat­ed to the non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion by Tar­kett, based in Solon, Ohio. The AC units were installed in the ranch’s club­house, where the non­prof­it teach­es kids 7–18 years-old equine edu­ca­tion dur­ing sum­mer camp. How­ev­er, after the AC units were installed, orga­ni­za­tion rep­re­sen­ta­tives – which spend all year res­cu­ing, reha­bil­i­tat­ing and find­ing lov­ing homes for neglect­ed and abused hors­es – were faced with the real­i­ty that they need­ed to upgrade the facil­i­ty in order to effi­cient­ly cool the club­house, even with the new AC units. The orga­ni­za­tion appealed to its sup­port­ers, who con­tact­ed the Auen Foun­da­tion.

“We nev­er want to be a res­cue facil­i­ty that needs to be res­cued,” said David DiMeno, Pres­i­dent of Coachel­la Val­ley Horse Res­cue and Coachel­la Val­ley Mount­ed Rangers. “The Auen Foun­da­tion helped make this pos­si­ble. Now we can start sum­mer camp with a cool club­house and then use it all year long as we con­tin­ue to edu­cate the com­mu­ni­ty.”

The Auen Foun­da­tion pro­vid­ed a grant to insu­late a por­tion of the club­house, add an inte­ri­or wall, install a slid­ing glass door, drop a por­tion of the ceil­ing and redo light­ing with­in the low­er ceil­ing. All of the upgrades – to increase the facility’s max­i­mum cool­ing poten­tial – were man­aged by Supe­ri­or Heat­ing and Air Con­di­tion­ing.

“Often, projects are best accom­plished through a part­ner­ship,” said Catharine Reed, Senior Pro­gram Offi­cer for the Auen Foun­da­tion. “Coachel­la Val­ley Horse Res­cue found that an air con­di­tion­er dona­tion was not enough. They dis­cov­ered they also need­ed addi­tion­al upgrades in order for the AC units to run most effi­cient­ly. We are hap­py we could help this orga­ni­za­tion that helps many ani­mals and peo­ple in a num­ber of ways.”

The pri­ma­ry mis­sion of Coachel­la Val­ley Horse Res­cue is to res­cue and care for abused and neglect­ed hors­es and find them safe homes. In addi­tion, the orga­ni­za­tion part­ners with oth­er non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tions through­out the Coachel­la Val­ley to edu­cate chil­dren and adults about ani­mal cru­el­ty and equine edu­ca­tion.

Begin­ning June 12, Coachel­la Val­ley Horse Res­cue is offer­ing three 3-day sum­mer camp ses­sions. Campers learn to ride and care for hors­es dai­ly from 7 a.m.-5 p.m. at the organization’s 8-acre facil­i­ty in Indio. And, now, class­room time will be espe­cial­ly cool – thanks to the grant from the Auen Foun­da­tion.

For more infor­ma­tion about Coachel­la Val­ley Horse Res­cue or the sum­mer camp call 760–808-6279 or go to cvhorserescue.org, or email the sum­mer camp direc­tor at rescuedirector@cvhorserescue.org.

AAP — Food Samar­i­tans (AAP) announced today that the Auen Foun­da­tion recent­ly award­ed a $25,000 grant to the orga­ni­za­tion to sup­port its food vouch­er pro­gram for low-income Coachel­la Val­ley res­i­dents who suf­fer from HIV/AIDS and oth­er chron­ic ill­ness­es. This is the 18th con­sec­u­tive year that the Auen Foun­da­tion has sup­port­ed this pro­gram.

“We are impressed by the AAP – Food Samar­i­tans recent expan­sion of its mis­sion,” said Catharine Reed, Senior Pro­gram Offi­cer for the Auen Foun­da­tion. “For more than 26 years, this orga­ni­za­tion has offered nutri­tion­al sup­port to Coachel­la Val­ley res­i­dents that need it the most. Orig­i­nal­ly, AAP was focused on serv­ing peo­ple liv­ing with HIV/AIDS, but they recent­ly expand­ed their mis­sion to include peo­ple liv­ing with oth­er chron­ic ill­ness­es. We applaud this expan­sion and out­reach to some of our community’s most vul­ner­a­ble res­i­dents.”

AAP – Food Samar­i­tans was found­ed in 1991 to help the most at-risk mem­bers of the Greater Palm Springs com­mu­ni­ty – peo­ple who are low-income and com­pro­mised by HIV/AIDS. It recent­ly expand­ed its ser­vices to include peo­ple suf­fer­ing from can­cer, MS, heart or liv­er dis­ease, and oth­er chron­ic ill­ness­es. Its ongo­ing mis­sion is to ensure that all AAP clients can con­tin­ue to live their lives with dig­ni­ty and self-respect.

“I’m pleased that AAP – Food Samar­i­tans has had such a ben­e­fi­cial and long-stand­ing rela­tion­ship with the Auen Foun­da­tion,” said Mark Anton, CEO and Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of AAP. “Their ongo­ing sup­port of AAP has played a vital role in ensur­ing that we con­tin­ue to ful­fill our mis­sion of pro­vid­ing month­ly nutri­tion­al sup­port to low income Coachel­la Val­ley res­i­dents who live with chron­ic ill­ness. AAP does not receive fed­er­al or state finan­cial assis­tance, so gen­er­ous pri­vate dona­tions like this allow us to con­tin­ue to sup­port the peo­ple who need it most.”

The Auen Foun­da­tion award­ed Cal­i­for­nia State Uni­ver­si­ty, San Bernardi­no Palm Desert Cam­pus with emer­gency and gap fund­ing for stu­dents who qual­i­fy. The $50,000 grant was pre­sent­ed to CSUSB Palm Desert Cam­pus to cre­ate a needs-based, finan­cial sup­port sys­tem for cur­rent stu­dents enrolled in the region’s only four-year pub­lic uni­ver­si­ty. “These funds will help stu­dents who are prob­a­bly already mak­ing sac­ri­fices and fac­ing chal­lenges to attend uni­ver­si­ty,” said Dr. Sharon Brown-Wel­ty, Dean of CSUSB Palm Desert Cam­pus. “An incred­i­ble 60 per­cent of our stu­dents qual­i­fy for max­i­mum fed­er­al and state finan­cial aid, and 36 per­cent of our stu­dents live at or below the pover­ty line. For those stu­dents scrap­ing to assure they are in col­lege, the expens­es of books and even food and trans­porta­tion can be addi­tion­al bar­ri­ers we are work­ing to over­come by estab­lish­ing this pro­gram through the gen­er­ous sup­port of the Auen Foun­da­tion.” Through an appli­ca­tion and inter­view process, stu­dents are pro­vid­ed with grants of up to $1,500 per cal­en­dar year to sup­port imme­di­ate and short-term chal­lenges that hin­der indi­vid­ual suc­cess. Fund­ing will be allo­cat­ed on a case-by-case basis, but pos­si­ble uses may include book and class mate­r­i­al expens­es, short-term trans­porta­tion needs, sup­port for house­hold basics in extra­or­di­nary cir­cum­stances, or tem­po­rary child­care resources. As stu­dents apply for these emer­gency grants, CSUSB Palm Desert Cam­pus admin­is­tra­tors plan to col­lect addi­tion­al data to deter­mine con­sis­tent obsta­cles that impede on col­lege stu­dents’ suc­cess­es. It is already known that the col­lege attain­ment rate in the Coachel­la Val­ley is less than 30 per­cent for all adults, and only 12 per­cent for His­pan­ic adults, which make up 40 per­cent of the com­mu­ni­ty. Under­stand­ing how to attract and sup­port addi­tion­al stu­dents in sec­ondary edu­ca­tion is a com­po­nent of how the Auen Foun­da­tion gift will fur­ther assist CSUSB Palm Desert Cam­pus. “The Auen Foun­da­tion believes in the impor­tance of high­er edu­ca­tion in our com­mu­ni­ty, and we have been sup­port­ing Cal State San Bernardino’s Palm Desert Cam­pus and its stu­dents since we moved here,” said Catharine Reed, Senior Pro­gram Offi­cer of the Auen Foun­da­tion. “Sec­ondary edu­ca­tion is becom­ing increas­ing­ly crit­i­cal for job secu­ri­ty, and we want to sup­port those stu­dents in our area who are mak­ing a com­mit­ment to achieve that goal.” CSUSB Palm Desert Cam­pus is locat­ed at 37500 Cook Street, Palm Desert. For more infor­ma­tion vis­it www.pdc.csusb.edu or call (760) 341‑2883.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the Auen Foun­da­tion joined many oth­er Palm Springs Air Muse­um donors as con­struc­tion on the organization’s fourth hang­er began. Three years in the mak­ing, the Ken­neth P. Miles Kore­an and Viet­nam War Hangar will house vin­tage air­craft and arti­facts from the Viet­nam, Kore­an and Cold War eras as well as a POW/MIA dis­play.

As a vin­tage T-28 amazed the crowd of about 100 with a fly over, Karen Miles, wid­ow of the late Major Gen­er­al Ken Miles, a loy­al sup­port­er of the muse­um, led the beam-sign­ing event. Oth­er donors and beam sign­ers in atten­dance includ­ed Lew and Dorothy Webb, Robert Webb, Fritz Frauchiger, Monte Marts, and Rhon­da Smith. Palm Springs Air Muse­um Board mem­bers attend­ing includ­ed Fred Bell, Robert Borns, Bill Bramer, Dan Gilbert­son, Jim Hous­ton, Bill Hugh­es, and Dr. Dave Thomp­son as well as muse­um staff, vol­un­teers, and var­i­ous com­mu­ni­ty sup­port­ers. Com­ments were made by Bell, Gilbert­son, Miles, Toni Aguil­lar for Con­gress­man Dr. Raul Ruiz’s office and Rita Massie for Super­vi­sor John Benoit’s office. All guests attend­ed a catered lunch by Carousel in the Pacif­ic Hang­er after the sign­ing cer­e­mo­ny.

Gen­er­al vis­i­tors to the muse­um were also offered an oppor­tu­ni­ty to sign the hang­er beam through­out the day. The fol­low­ing day, the beam was raised into posi­tion. The $2.25 mil­lion, 20,000 square foot hangar is 2–3 months away from com­ple­tion thanks to gen­er­ous sup­port of many addi­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty donors includ­ing the H.N. and Frances C. Berg­er Foun­da­tion, the Auen Foun­da­tion, Toy­ota Motor Sales of North Amer­i­ca, Mona and Ed Sher, Harold Matzn­er, Jolin­da Park­er, Phil Hixon and many oth­ers.

The Palm Springs Air Muse­um is locat­ed at 745 N. Gene Autry Trail, Palm Springs. The muse­um is open to the pub­lic dai­ly from 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. The non­prof­it organization’s next fundrais­ing event is the Palm Springs Air Museum’s 20th Anniver­sary Gala on Fri­day, Feb­ru­ary 17. For more infor­ma­tion, vis­it palmspringsairmuseum.org or call 760–778-6262.

The Neu­ro Vital­i­ty Cen­ter is expand­ing its facil­i­ties and its ser­vices, thanks, in part, to a grant from the Auen Foun­da­tion. The fam­i­ly foun­da­tion, which pri­mar­i­ly sup­ports char­i­ta­ble pro­grams and ser­vices aimed at meet­ing the social needs of mature adults and their fam­i­lies, pre­sent­ed the non­prof­it orga­ni­zaiton with a $30,000 grant to help open theLuhr & Clarise Jensen Exer­cise Ther­a­py Facil­i­ty. This addi­tion­al build­ing will increase the Neu­ro Vital­i­ty Center’s space by 3,000 square feet, and allow the Cen­ter to offer more com­pre­hen­sive ser­vices to peo­ple with stroke, trau­mat­ic brain injury (TBI) and oth­er neu­ro­log­i­cal diag­noses.

“Sup­port from the Auen Foun­da­tion and oth­ers are pro­vid­ing us with an oppor­tu­ni­ty to expand and offer more neu­ro­log­i­cal ser­vices in a sin­gle set­ting,” said Bev­er­ly Greer, Neu­ro Vital­i­ty Cen­ter CEO. “Thanks to the gen­eros­i­ty of indi­vid­ual dona­tions and grant con­tri­bu­tions, we are able to con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing patients with exer­cise and ther­a­py pro­grams even after their insur­ance is exhaust­ed. Avoid­ing gaps in ser­vice reduces many patient’s recov­ery times and improves their qual­i­ty of life.”

For more than 35 years, the Neu­ro Vital­i­ty Cen­ter, for­mer­ly the Stroke Recov­ery Cen­ter, has offered recre­ation, speech and exer­cise ther­a­py to help stroke and TBI vic­tims regain inde­pen­dence and improve their qual­i­ty of life. In recent years, the Cen­ter has also offered ser­vices to patients with Mul­ti­ple Scle­ro­sis and Parkinson’s Dis­ease. Ther­a­peu­tic reha­bil­i­ta­tion pro­grams address the phys­i­cal, psy­cho­log­i­cal, emo­tion­al and re-social­iza­tion needs of peo­ple with many forms of neu­ro­log­i­cal issues. Ser­vices at the cen­ter also extend to these patients’ fam­i­lies, who often seek coun­sel­ing, care­giv­ing skills and oth­er resources.

“The Neu­ro Vital­i­ty Cen­ter helps sur­vivors of dibil­i­tat­ing injuries and dis­eases regain and main­tain skills. These valu­able ser­vices impact people’s lives by not only increas­ing their abil­i­ties but also build­ing con­fi­dence lev­els, which is a ben­e­fit that can­not be mea­sured,” said Catharine Reed, Senior Pro­gram Offi­cer of the Auen Foun­da­tion.

The Neu­ro Vital­i­ty Cen­ter, is still locat­ed at 2800 East Ale­jo Road, Palm Springs. For more infor­ma­tion about the cen­ter, call 760–323-7676 or vis­it www.NeuroVitalityCenter.org.

A $25,000 grant from the Auen Foun­da­tion will add more large print books to the Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library’s per­ma­nent col­lec­tion. The gift was recent­ly pre­sent­ed to the Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library Foun­da­tion, a non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that sup­ports the award-win­ning, inde­pen­dent City-man­aged library and its pro­grams.

“We are delight­ed that the Auen Foun­da­tion chose to sup­port the Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library Foun­da­tion,” said Diane Sagan, the organization’s chair­per­son. “This gen­er­ous gift will help the Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library main­tain excel­lence in col­lec­tions, ser­vices and pro­grams.”

“Large print books keep our community’s seniors read­ing, even when they expe­ri­ence changes in their vision,” said Sher­rie Auen, Pro­gram Direc­tor for the Auen Foun­da­tion. “No one should be denied the oppor­tu­ni­ty to read. It’s a part of life­long learn­ing that so many peo­ple enjoy.”

Now cel­e­brat­ing the library’s 20th anniver­sary, the Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library has been rec­og­nized as one of the busiest and most admired libraries of its size in Cal­i­for­nia. The library offers print pub­li­ca­tions for all ages, mul­ti­me­dia selec­tions, access to tech­nol­o­gy. Plus, enter­tain­ment and cul­tur­al enrich­ment pro­grams are part of the library’s reg­u­lar sched­ule.

“The Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library was built on com­mu­ni­ty part­ner­ships, and we are hap­py to be a part of what makes this a fine com­mu­ni­ty asset,” said Catharine Reed, senior pro­gram offi­cer for the Auen Foun­da­tion.

The library has start­ed pur­chas­ing and pro­cess­ing a col­lec­tion that will include at least 1,500 new large print books with the Auen Foun­da­tion fund­ing. In recent years, pub­lish­ers have been active­ly pro­duc­ing more large print books in paper­back. This lighter, easy-to-read for­mat, improves the read­ing expe­ri­ence for those need­ing this type of assis­tance to main­tain the plea­sure of read­ing.

“This is a tremen­dous gift that will have long term impact on the avail­abil­i­ty of large print books for our patrons who keep read­ing because of their com­fort with this for­mat,” said David Bryant, library direc­tor. “Each book we add will have a book­plate, not­ing that the vol­ume is avail­able because of the gen­eros­i­ty of the Auen Foun­da­tion.”

All of the new large print books will be avail­able for check­out with a Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library card. Cal­i­for­nia res­i­dents with a valid ID can receive a card through an easy reg­is­tra­tion process. Sea­son­al res­i­dents, show­ing proof of a Ran­cho Mirage address, will also be issued a free card. Out-of-state vis­i­tors are charged a mod­est card fee. The library is eager to serve the entire Coachel­la Val­ley and beyond.

The Ran­cho Mirage Pub­lic Library is locat­ed at 71–100 High­way 111, Ran­cho Mirage. For more infor­ma­tion, go to www.ranchomiragelibrary.org or call 760–341-7323.